My Life in Books: At the “No Love Allowed” Launch

KATE EVANGELISTA being interviewed by Mina Esguerra during the No Love Allowed book launch.

As I’ve mentioned in previous posts, Kate Evangelista has been a longtime fixture on this blog. Over the years, I’ve interviewed her, reviewed her books, and even had lunch with her. She’s a nice lady, who you can’t help but feel happy for when she gets nice things.

And one of the nice things to happen to her recently was the launch for her newest book, No Love Allowed. Published by Swoon Reads – a Macmillan publishing imprint – No Love Allowed tells the story of Didi and Caleb and serves as a sort of prequel to No Holding Back, which I reviewed recently.

Here’s the book’s blurb!

Caleb desperately needs a fake girlfriend. Either he attends a series of parties for his father’s law firm with a pretty girl on his arm, or he gets shipped off to Yale to start a future he’s not ready for and isn’t sure he wants. And sadly, the last unattached girl in his social circle has just made the grievous mistake of falling in love with him. Fortunately, Didi, recently fired waitress and aspiring painter, is open to new experiences. As the summer ticks by in a whirl of lavish parties, there’s only one rule: They must not fall in love!

At the event, Kate talked a little bit about Twilight – which was what got her into writing in the first place – as well as her own tumultuous journey towards publication. That journey included breaking up with an agent, considering self-publication, before finally finding herself with three contracts with three different publishing houses – you can find out more about her “superhero origin”, so to speak, in my blog post here.

Kate also talked about the genesis of No Love Allowed, how it started out with Caleb as a surfer and how finishing it in just a number of weeks ended up with her being hospitalized. She also talked about how she tried to work three tropes into the novel – that of an arranged marriage, the “ugly duckling”, and “the girl from the wrong side of the tracks”. She also revealed how writing contemporary romance is so much more difficult than fantasy, owing to the fact that you have to work harder to keep the reader entertained.

All in all, it was a fun little launch for an author who’s been working so hard at it for several years now. It was also a great opportunity meeting up with friends I’ve made all over the blogosphere and #romanceclass, as well as to toast the success of a Filipino author.